How Does Elizabeth Bennet Change

In Alistair Duckworth’s account Pride and Prejudice: The Reconstitution of Society, he characterizes Darcy as a conservative individual, whereas he shows Elizabeth to possess a more mobile and active personality. However, upon analysis of the novel, it is clearly visible that Elizabeth has a more preservative attitude while Darcy tends to have more mobility to improve.
Duckworth depicts Elizabeth Bennet as an active character who is willing to alter. In his article, he shows Elizabeth as able “to improve” to better fulfill both Darcy and society’s demands of strict class and Victorian manners; he characterizes Elizabeth as a dynamic person that brings the story together. However, Elizabeth is actually a very stationary character who only needs
308, Duckworth). However, Darcy is the character who makes the largest change that is most significant to the novel. Through his change of personality, Elizabeth is able to cross the social classes and form their union. Darcy changed his entire mindset of manners and moves past his prejudice to accept people of lower social levels. While Elizabeth had little to change from, Darcy managed to seemingly change overnight to better mold into the shape that Elizabeth desires. His entire mindset is “strikingly altered” (pg. 213, Austen). This sudden, important change is what largely causes the novel to end on happy terms because it better allows Elizabeth to see Darcy as a better person and one worthy of marrying. As well, it was Darcy who wrote the letter to Elizabeth that caused her to understand the situation in an effort to actively make himself on better terms. On the contrary, one may believe that Darcy has remained on a stationary “social point” while Elizabeth is the one who must adapt and change herself and improve her own acceptance and perspective. One may feel that Elizabeth is the one who must recognize the “moral and social limits within which she must live” (pg. 314, Duckworth). It is acknowledgeable that Darcy remains relatively stable, but he has reached out a hand to accept people of lower classes as equals, an act that people of higher rank do not
At the Netherfield Ball, both Darcy and Elizabeth are visibly out of place. This setting is very reflective of the instability of their first impressions (Netherfield is rented). At the ball, Darcy seems to be almost cold to the lower classes, showing his personality before his dynamic change; he is widely regarded as “the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world” for his behavior (pg. 8, Austen). Elizabeth then wrongly forms an impression that Darcy has too much pride, coming to quick conclusions because of her own confidence in her ability to comprehend people’s views; this in turn gives the reader false impressions because Elizabeth’s mind is the only one in which we can view. At Pemberley however, our understanding of the situation and the character’s feelings has stabilized, reflecting the heritage and nobility of this estate. At Pemberley, Darcy has visibly passed his prejudice of class and manners and has accepted Elizabeth despite her rank, the key landmark achievement that ultimately results in the perfect union of the two.
Alistair Duckworth has many flaws in his conclusion, but in some aspects, he is correct. Because Duckworth’s claims were largely based on invalid evidence on which character had pride or prejudice, his conclusion is not completely valid, but the main idea is conveyable that their marriage is one where the characters do achieve a perfect union “to the